Okay, I finally got enough time and an adequate frame of mind to tackle the Savannah/Jekyll Island trip – or at least part of it. You may note that, while I talk about cleverly handling a schedule in the podcast, I never actually said when I would get around to this, so I’m not behind schedule at all.
As before, I am including a few images to help illustrate the narrative, if I may use such an overblown word. This time around, it doesn’t matter too much if you jump ahead. But maybe later it will, so this could be good practice for you.
Walkabout podcast – Necessary research
Did you get to the part discussing the Georgia Sea Turtle Center yet? Good – you can now scroll down to the next three pics below. You can also check out my previous visits to the center here, and here, mostly for the images – the information hasn’t changed in any significant way.
Above, a green sea turtle (Chelonia mydas) during its veterinary exam – I did not think to check the info board on this one to find out what the missing forelimb was attributed to; while many injuries to sea turtles come through encounters with boats, fishing gear, and garbage, wounds of this nature are often caused by sharks, which can target the limbs easier than the armored torso. Many of the shark attacks on humans come from the exact same trait, as sharks see the arms and legs of surfers dangling in the water to either side of a surfboard from underneath, and register the silhouette as a turtle. Most such injuries to humans are bite-and-release, not because the sharks are as sporting as fishermen (or at least we don’t think so,) but because the taste and texture is all wrong and sharks don’t consider humans as a food source.
To the left, two of many very young diamondback terrapins (Malaclemys terrapin) hanging out in their little “day care center” until they are big and healthy enough to release – you gotta love that shell pattern. They measured approximately 3cm in carapace length. The numbers painted on their backs were used just to tell them apart for medical records and not, as I was told, because the staff raced them after hours, disappointing me greatly. Why would you waste such an opportunity?
Below, a shot showing the lovely shell pattern of another green sea turtle – the plastic pipe in the pool is weighted and primed with vegetable matter when feeding time comes around, letting the turtle pluck its food from the bottom in imitation of natural behavior. Green sea turtles, by the way, primarily get their name from the color of their fat, and occasionally their skin like the exam image above; the shells are usually various shades of brown as seen here.
Now, you can wait here until I talk about heading out to get sunset photos on Driftwood Beach…
While you’ve already seen the better version of this photo sequence, I’m posting this one because it shows what the sunset itself looked like; the sun’s someplace behind that weird cloud bank. The horizon colors allowed from some vibrant backgrounds only with selective cropping.
Meanwhile, I haven’t the faintest idea who this is, but she was posed enigmatically on the railing as I approached the fishing pier on the north end of the island, so I positioned myself for the best framing I could, lucky enough that no one else was visible on the pier at the time but unlucky enough not to have any rich colors extending to the sky behind her. It’s a useful illustration of how photography often works; the pier had plenty of people on it, mostly night fishermen, but without capturing any it appears completely empty and the isolation of the lone woman is paramount. Yet, when compared against the other images taken the same evening, these colors seem flat, but had you not seen those, you probably would not have been aware of any lack and could accept the delicate sky as it was.
Below, the view from the same fishing pier northeast across the sound to St Simon’s Island and the lighthouse thereon, as a few late beachcombers stroll on the sand. Some of the driftwood that gives the beach its name can be seen, but it occurs to pedantic me that this is a misnomer; the dead trees all come from right there, as the shifting shoreline encroaches on the forested area, so none of this is actually driftwood. Now, when the wave action tears them free and carries them someplace else, then they’re driftwood, but they’re appearing on some other beach by that time. I suppose, for the sake of convenience, we’ll just assume that they were all carried back by the waves and are appropriately named.
Okay, if you’re still practicing your good behavior without jumping ahead, you should be waiting here until I mention getting back from chasing crabs and starting a photo session in the bathroom.
From much later that evening, one of the images I was taking in the bathroom of the motel as the others slept. You can easily tell this is a sand dollar, a type of sea urchin (order Clypeasteroida,) and it’s just starting to industriously bury itself in the sand after I placed it in a good position to photograph; the mouth is the opening to the left of center. By the way, if you hold one in your hand for a bit, you can feel it begin to crawl sideways in an attempt to find sand to conceal itself within.
And one more capture from the day, again stirred up from the seabottom near shore quite easily. I have no actual idea what this is; I had initially thought it was an anemone of sorts, but nothing that I’ve found so far matches, and I wish now that I’d taken more broad illustrative photos (I did not bring any specimens home with me as I am not maintaining a saltwater tank.) Overall, the species had the appearance of a thick kind of lily pad about 15mm across, with a stem (without roots) extending up to a thick oval body along one downturned edge. The underside was pale, while the top side was pinkish-red but covered in pale spots; each of these spots produced an individual trunk capped with, it appears, eight pseudopods or ‘arms’ after resting undisturbed in the water for a short time. Every anemone that I’ve found seems to have the trunk and arms, but are thus individual specimens – this was, to all appearances, a single organism producing a group of feeding trunks. If you have any ideas whatsoever, let me know, because I’m stumped.
As it ambled along, I saw a rolled leaf in the middle distance (for a small spider, at least) ahead of it, and suspected that this was its destination. Unwilling to disappoint me, the spider quickly made its way up the stem in question and disappeared into the rolled leaf, appearing briefly at the other side long enough for me to fire off a shot. Some spiders make breeding nests out of rolled leaves, 
I’ll also take this opportunity to illustrate a simple but important, and often forgotten, facet of macro photography. As I did some portraits of the other mantis since it was slightly more cooperative, I was able to do some comparison shots. Both of these were taken only moments apart without the mantis moving more than a fraction; the difference comes from my position. I saw the antenna falling in front of one compound eye, as well as the leaf in the immediate background lining up right behind the mantis’ head, and shifted position slightly, framing the head against darkness instead and dropping below the antenna – the change also allowed the flash to illuminate the forelegs better. Such a trivial amount of effort to significantly improve the photo, and all it takes is an awareness of the background (including knowing that it will become sharper as the aperture closes down.) Increasing contrast at the point of focus always helps draw the viewer’s eye, done in this case by framing the bright green head against the blackness instead of the green leaves, and the complementary lines of leaves and mantis body are a nice bonus. Don’t get me wrong – I don’t consider this high art, but it’s a nice comparison illustration, and the more of this you can accomplish the stronger your images will be.
By this time I had the camera ready, and did a quick photo session with the transplant, who may or may not decide to remain in the area; either way, it has much better access to food, shelter, and potential mates than the interior of Home Depot. Treefrogs do not spend much time at all in the water, but they do need to remain moist, and will deposit their eggs in or near the water so the hatching tadpoles are in the right environment. I’m fairly certain we had a grey treefrog hatching last year, and at present there are five juvenile green frogs (Lithobates clamitans, the more aquatic and non-tree-climbing cousins) living within the pond, though the tadpoles seem to have vanished quickly for unknown reasons. We’ll just have to see what happens.
… but then I rotate them and say to myself, You know, I think they go this way. I mean, if you want the most accurate rendition for these images, the first thing you’d have to do is lay your monitor back almost flat, since I was probably aiming largely downward from above, but that’s the best I can tell you. And if I’m having this much trouble knowing, then it likely doesn’t make any difference – pick the orientation that you like best and boom, you got the right one as far as I’m concerned.
Friday evening, the rain decided to throw down (it was certainly much harder than falling,) and typically for the weather we’re having this year, it passed quickly. As the sun returned, I checked to see if we were having a rainbow, but saw nothing. Turns out it was only being fashionably late, and wasn’t terribly bright when it arrived, but as The Girlfriend and I looked towards the top of the arc, we could distinctly see something that I first witnessed 
This is the same image, but with saturation thrown way the hell up – there will be another version at the bottom of this post. Now the additional bands below the main bow are plainly visible, reducing in width and starting to give a three-dimensional effect, as if numerous bows were stacked alongside one another into the distance, and we’re seeing their undersides. This is not the case, since rainbows are an optical phenomenon of light 
Soon afterward, the sun rose into that line that can be seen over it, in the photo above, which was another solid wall of clouds – at that point the conditions sank back into hazy twilight. I waited around a bit, and was rewarded by the occasional appearance that let me do some more moody breaker photos. For unknown reasons, the birds were particularly sparse on this trip – I did not see one pelican at all – and so the ‘typical’ beach wildlife shots weren’t part of the gallery this time around. Even the occasional seagull or tern was framed against darker clouds and lower light conditions, making it hard to freeze them in midair since the shutter speeds went a little too long to allow this – you’ve seen perhaps the best example in the previous post.
As they get larger, the camo pattern fades, perhaps because they’re faster and more adept at escaping, and also maybe because they’re no longer good targets, in size and defensiveness, for predators. I spotted one ducking into a larger burrow as I approached, and sat down to wait it out, which doesn’t take too long.
This one was about 4cm across the carapace, so not quite a hand-span in overall width, and I wasn’t shooting with a long focal length for this at all; just a little out of the frame at bottom were my crossed legs. The crab dragged up a load of sand tucked into its legs and pincers, moving cautiously but not particularly slowly, and since I’d been sitting with the camera already raised to my eye it was easy enough to get a sequence of frames. Now, the camera isn’t particularly heavy (though I think I still had the flash attached,) but when you have to sit perfectly still in ready position and wait for something to happen, you quickly realize how fatiguing this can be. I could have spent some time building myself a nice comfortable lounge chair out of sand, but by then the sun would have been too high and the crabs would have called it a day. Maybe next trip.
My timing was right on this one: if you look closely at upper right, you can actually see sand in midair that the crab was flinging away. As soon as this action takes place the crab typically shoots back into the burrow, instinctively aware that the motion attracts attention. This makes me wonder what purpose is served by hurling the sand away rather than simply depositing it subtly, which would be a lot harder to see, but I’ve watched this behavior from numerous specimens so it seems to be typical.